5 Biggest Mistakes Businesses Make with their Giveaways and Tips on Avoiding Them

Last updated on April 11th, 2024 at 08:28 pm

The importance of distinguishing a brand from its competitors is vital in building a strong customer relationship. Therefore, you must take advantage of customer-centric programs like giveaways to generate a buzz around your brand and ensure you promote camaraderie among your customers. Statistics indicate that an average of more than 34% of new customers are generated through contests and giveaways.

However, running a business giveaway is easier said than done and usually involves several moving parts that would ensure success. Although a decent chunk is giving it their best shot, several businesses running contests still end up making common mistakes that leave most participants disappointed and discouraged from purchasing from their brands. 

This article will look at common business giveaway mistakes and provide you with essential tips to avoid them. It will give you the blueprint on how to run a successful giveaway.

Table of Contents

• 1. Poor Giveaway Strategy
• 2. Lack of Official Rules
• 3. Unappealing Prizes
• 4. Running Contests for Too Long
• 5. Difficult Registration Process

1. Poor Giveaway Strategy

Poor strategy is perhaps the most significant mistake a business can make in running a giveaway contest. Often, most businesses dive head first into initiating giveaways without defining contest goals and objectives. This increases the likelihood for miscommunication and other technical issues that would otherwise be eliminated with a comprehensive giveaway marketing strategy. 

An excellent giveaway strategy empowers businesses to avoid poor entry rates and ensure effective contesting to generate the expected results. The advantage with a robust giveaway strategy is it gives you a standard of what a successful giveaway will look like. This way, you can reduce arguments and get your team on the same page to meet specific objectives to reach your desired goal of success. 

2. Lack of Official Rules

Establishing official giveaway rules and regulations might mean additional work but it often spells the difference in a successful giveaway contest. Without set rules in place, your giveaway may result in confusion or worse, potentially leave your business open for reputational damages, legal action, and complaints. Therefore, you must publish your official giveaway rules a few days before the contest to give participants a room to review them. 

When setting rules, you must define participant eligibility by listing specific residency and age restrictions. Prohibiting your employees, affiliates, and their family members from participating in the contest also ensures objectivity and prevents backlash from neutral participants. You should also indicate how the winner will be chosen and notified while specifying how you will use the personal data you’ve gathered to avoid confusion and legal trouble. 

3. Unappealing Prizes

Unappealing and irrelevant prizes is another reason most giveaways don’t have a higher participant turnout. Usually, most individuals don’t have an idea of giveaway prizes, what it does, and exactly what the value is. When potential participants are not sold on the idea of your prize, this may increase the likelihood in them participating without feeling thoroughly persuaded or avoiding the contest altogether. 

One way to avoid this is to brainstorm several giveaway ideas for social media and determine what initially brought your audience to your brand. A rule of thumb is to use your product as a giveaway to generate buzz and help gauge customer interest. Using your products as part of your giveaway contests also provides the winners with a teaser on what they can expect should they continue doing business with you, ultimately increasing your conversions and sales in the long-term. 

4. Running Contests for Too Long

It is not uncommon for businesses to run giveaways for longer periods in the hopes of generating and maximizing traffic. However, this strategy can backfire and often result in participants even forgetting about your contests entirely. On the flip side, if you don’t run it long enough, you may reduce the number of individuals who will get a chance to enter. 

Although there is no one-size-fits-all narrative in running giveaways, the sweet spot for typical contest duration is around two to four weeks. This is a sufficient time to ensure that your marketing strategies will mature but not too long that it begins to drag on and participants start to complain. By setting an appropriate contest duration, you can avoid the risk of losing the urgency that will persuade people to enter as soon as they find out about your giveaway. 

5. Difficult Registration Process

Many marketers often make the mistake of asking users to go through several registration processes and fill out multiple forms to enter their contests. While this is an excellent way of gathering relevant data, doing so may discourage potential entrants from converting and joining your giveaway. Data shows that 74.3% of individuals hate forms because they consume too much time and effort and provide less value. 

Thus, using powerful marketing technologies like a giveaway software solution is essential in reducing participant frustration and ensuring a successful contest. A dynamic giveaway software platform makes it easier for your customers to join the contest because it integrates with social media platforms easily, allowing them to log in using their Twitter or Facebook accounts. You can check several marketing software examples to find the right giveaway software platform for your current and future contests. 

Avoiding Giveaway Mistakes and Ensuring Success

Preventing giveaway mistakes is often a challenge for businesses who lack the tools necessary to automate specific processes like contest duration, fraud protection, and contest creation. One way to ensure you run a successful giveaway is to leverage a dynamic marketing software platform to manage your giveaways. You can start with a social media contest tool like SweepWidget. 

SweepWidget is a social media giveaway tool designed to help businesses gain new social media followers, generate leads, and increase conversions by running giveaways, sweepstakes, and contests. It boasts over 30 built-in apps and 90-plus entry methods that make it easier for customers to take part in your giveaways. SweepWidget is free to sign up but users can take advantage of the Pro, Business, Premium, and Enterprise plans for additional functionalities.